1 How Systems Are Born – Theorising as a Systemic Act
What does it mean to theorise?
To theorise is not to withdraw from the world, but to participate in it more deeply — to construe not just what is happening, but what could happen. In the relational model we've been building, theorising is not a detached intellectual activity. It is a systemic act of meaning-making: a way of construing instances as instances of something more general — something held open as potential.
We might say:
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Instances are what we perceive, experience, observe.
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Systems are how we construe what we perceive as part of a pattern.
And theorising is the bridge: the act of creating or recognising a system from a history of instances.
System and Instance: Not Things, but Perspectives
In this ontology, "system" and "instance" are not types of object. They are perspectival construals of meaning. The same phenomenon may be construed as instance from one perspective, and as system from another — just as weather is an instance of climate, a sentence an instance of language, or a particle track an instance of a quantum field.
Halliday offered a compelling shorthand: system–&–process.
This formulation reminds us that the "system" pole is not a static structure, and the "instance" pole is not a random event. Together, they form a process: an unfolding through which the potential of the system is instantiated, and the system itself is reshaped in the process.
From Meaning to Meaning-Making
What we call a "system" is simply a structured range of possible meanings — a network of constraints that shape what counts as a valid unfolding. Language, in this sense, is not just a medium for meaning-making. It is itself a theory of experience: a system of systems, each developed to differentiate meaning in patterned ways.
But this is not unique to language.
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Climate theorises weather.
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Quantum fields theorise particles.
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Social norms theorise behaviours.
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A musical key theorises notes and their relations.
In each case, the system is a meaning-maker. It structures how new events are construed, by providing a framework for what they might mean.
Theorising as Construal of Potential
To theorise is to identify coherence across difference.
It is to say: this was not random — it is part of a pattern. But more than that, it is to build a grammar for that pattern: a system that can be used to anticipate, orient, and constrain future instances.
This means that theorising is not just a descriptive act. It is intervention — a selective construal that stabilises certain differences and not others. And this construal creates the system: not as a thing in itself, but as a field of potential for future instantiation.
In this view:
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A system is not found, but made.
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A theory is not discovered, but construed.
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Theorising is the process by which potential becomes meaningful.
Looking Ahead
In the next post, we will explore how theorising emerges directly from experience. How do we go from the particular to the general — from this event to a whole field of possibility? And how does this act of generalisation begin to shape what counts as meaningful in the first place?
2 From Event to Pattern – Seeing the System in the Instance
To theorise is to see more than what is there.
Not because we are adding illusion or invention, but because we are discerning pattern — structure across difference. In this post, we ask: how does this begin? How do we go from a single event to the construal of a system?
Every Instance Hints at a System
No experience arrives alone.
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A gust of wind is part of the weather.
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A spoken clause is part of a text.
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A flash on a screen is part of a particle’s history.
Even before we name it, every instance arrives with the feel of structure — of coming from somewhere, of belonging to a pattern.
Theorising emerges from this felt sense: the intuition that what we experience is not just what happens, but a happening within a field of meaning. And this field can be modelled.
Logogenesis and the Rise of Pattern
In systemic linguistics, the unfolding of a text — its logogenesis — gives us a model for how systems take shape:
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A clause is spoken.
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It constrains what can come next.
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Over time, these constraints sediment into expectation.
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These expectations become the scaffolding of a system.
This process generalises:
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A single raindrop is just water.
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But a sequence of storms becomes "a pattern".
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From enough storms, we theorise: climate.
The system is not added on top of the instances. It emerges through their construal — through the differentiation of meaning in context.
Generalisation Is Construal, Not Abstraction
In classical metaphysics, generalisation is often treated as abstraction — the stripping away of detail to leave a bare concept. But in our model, generalisation is not subtraction. It is systemic construal:
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We don’t just remove the particular.
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We hold it open across a field of difference.
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We create a space of potential, structured by past unfoldings.
That is: we see the present as an instance of what could happen, and not merely as what did.
This reframes the act of theorising as inherently generative — not capturing what is, but opening space for what may become.
Potential Is Built from Instantiations
This is the critical turn:
Potential is not “out there” waiting to be discovered. It is made through the construal of instances.
When a linguist constructs a system network, they are theorising from a history of texts.
When a physicist models a quantum field, they are theorising from interactions and traces.
When a child learns what counts as “kind,” they are theorising from social experience.
In every case, the field of potential is a systemic theory of the unfolding instance — a grammar for how meaning happens.
Looking Ahead
Theorising begins in experience, but it reshapes that very experience. Once a system is construed, it changes how future instances are interpreted — and what counts as a meaningful event.
In the next post, we explore this recursive loop:
How systems shape the space of future possibilities.
3 Recursion and Feedback – How Systems Reshape the Real
Once a system is construed, the world is no longer the same.
We don’t just interpret the present through the past — we actively reshape the field of what becomes possible. This is the recursive nature of meaning: every instance not only arises from a potential, but feeds back to reshape that potential.
System Is Not a Container, But a Dynamic Orientation
A system is often pictured as a fixed set of rules or forms. But in relational ontology, a system is a perspectival construal:
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It is a way of seeing meaning across instances.
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It constrains what counts as meaningful.
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And it orients how new instances are interpreted, selected, and instantiated.
Thus, system is not an external container for events — it is the unfolding orientation through which events become meaningful at all.
From Feedback to Reorganisation
Each new instance shifts the system:
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A speaker utters a novel clause — and the grammar adapts to accommodate it.
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A climate event exceeds expectations — and the model is recalibrated.
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A particle behaves in an unpredicted way — and the field theory is revised.
Instance arises within system → Instance perturbs system → System reorients future potential.
This recursive dynamic makes the system open, historical, and semiotic.
Probability Is Grammar
In language, the system behaves similarly:
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Every utterance shifts the probability of what follows.
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Every new text adds to the evolving pattern of what “makes sense.”
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The grammar is not static; it is constantly reweighted by its instances.
This is why system is not separate from history: it is reshaped by it.
And why theory is not timeless: it is temporal scaffolding, grounded in experience.
Reperception: Seeing Differently Through the System
Once a system is construed, it retroactively reorganises experience.
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We “see” grammatical structure in speech.
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We “detect” particles in flashes on a screen.
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We “recognise” a storm as part of a climate pattern.
This is reperception — a shift in how reality appears, grounded in new relational potential.
A System Is Never Final
Because it arises from and reshapes meaning, every system is:
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Recursive: feeding back into its own unfolding;
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Provisional: always open to reconfiguration;
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Ethical: since it constrains what is possible and what is seen.
Looking Ahead
How is the theorist also part of the system?
4 Theorist as Participant – Meaning from the Inside
Theorising Is Construal From Within
To theorise is not to step outside experience and capture it from afar.
It is to become aware of patterned difference from within the field of experience, and to shape that difference into potential.
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The linguist hears language and construes a grammar.
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The physicist sees traces and construes a field.
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The speaker reflects on their own meaning and construes a category.
Knowing Is Not Neutral
The act of system-making is not abstract. It is grounded in:
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Embodiment – where we stand and how we perceive.
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Context – what we attend to and what we ignore.
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Value – what we care about and why we pursue pattern at all.
This makes the theorist a participant in the unfolding of the system:
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They don’t just describe structure.
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They contribute to its shape.
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Their construal enters the feedback loop of the system itself.
A theory always carries its perspective—even when it claims universality.
Theorising Is a Metarelation
A system is a relation among instances.
But theorising is a relation to those relations—a metarelation:
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The theorist doesn’t just use language—they model its systemic potential.
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The climatologist doesn’t just experience weather—they construe its dynamics across time and place.
This shift in perspective enables:
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Generalisation – seeing across particular events.
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Anticipation – projecting new instances into potential futures.
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Restructuring – remodelling what counts as possible or probable.
Theory Is Meaning of a Particular Kind
Theory is not meaning in general.
This makes theory both dependent on and transformative of experience.
Like all meaning, theory is:
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Situated: it emerges within specific historical, cultural, and dialogic contexts.
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Relational: it connects past patterns to future construals.
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Participatory: it requires active engagement in the world it describes.
Looking Ahead
5 Theory Evolves – Transformation from Within
A theory is not fixed.
It emerges, shifts, collapses, recomposes.
In this final post, we ask:
How do systems change? How does theory evolve from within the very field it construes?
Systems Are Recursive
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A text shifts the probabilities of future texts.
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A new word reshapes the semantic space.
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A new measurement alters the structure of physical theory.
Transformation Is Internal
We often picture system change as an external disruption.
But from a relational view, transformation comes from within:
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Contradiction: when an instance doesn’t fit the expected pattern.
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Ambiguity: when construal is unstable or overloaded.
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Innovation: when a new construal stabilises into regularity.
Theorising Is Part of System Evolution
When a theorist construes a system, their construal enters the field.
It does not float above the world—it participates in it.
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When Halliday theorised systemic networks, he reshaped how language was taught, researched, and understood.
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When physicists revised the concept of energy, it altered not only theories, but machines, economies, and ecologies.
Systems Can Split or Fold
Sometimes, a shift is local—new options within an existing structure.
Other times, the change is systemic:
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A paradigm splits: new theories emerge that no longer share foundational assumptions.
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A field folds: previous categories collapse, and new dimensions of construal are needed.
They mark cuts in the topology of meaning, and reconfigure the conditions for participation.
Meaning Is Always Becoming
There is no final system.
No finished theory.
This means that:
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Theorising is not merely cognitive—it is ethical, social, and historical.
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Every construal of potential opens or closes paths for future becoming.
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To theorise is to participate in the evolution of meaning.
Coda: The System Is Us
We began by asking how systems are born.
We end by recognising:
We are not separate from the systems we construe.
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The speaker is part of the language.
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The physicist is part of the universe.
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The theorist is part of the theory.
Coda: Living in the System
Systems are not behind the scenes.
They are not hidden mechanisms or abstract rules.
They are patterns of possibility—construed, enacted, and transformed in the living moments of meaning-making.
This series has traced how systems are born:
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From the perception of patterned experience,
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Through the construal of instances,
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Into the formulation of potential,
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And onward to recursive evolution.
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